Indigenous Peoples

Last week in Canada, with federal MPs returning to Parliament amidst the continuation of countrywide protests by indigenous peoples, an opposition MP introduced a private member’s bill (Bill C-469) to require the Canadian government to ensure that all federal laws are consistent with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (A/RES/61/295). I’ll state clearly at the outset that this isn’t the first such proposal of its kind, with two other private member’s bills with the same general intent of giving domestic legal effect to the Declaration having been introduced in June 2008 (Bill C-569) and February 2009 (Bill C-328), later reinstated in March 2010. But the discussion that has ensued with respect to enacting domestic legislation to give a non-legally binding declaratory text status and pull within domestic law raises interesting questions for our understanding of the sources of international legal obligation (versus the sources of aspiration and political commitment), as well as concerns about the impact of UN efforts that raise unmet expectations. On the other hand, this may…